The Labor enquirer., 1887-02-26
Let not the Children Of Light
Farley With Dark
nessI
An Earnest Word From Com
rade " m. G. Owen to Com.
rade John Swint0n.
'"Hew to the Line, Let lhe Chips
fall Where They
I'm Mayi".
For the Enqhirsr.

30, Sir. Jphn SWintons the radical
John Swinton, the iconoclast: John
Swinton, the exposer Of shams, congrat-
ulates himself that HE did not fling the
I. ligious firbbrand into the harmonious
labor CIRCLE and "and our country cor
respondents" are raked in from the four
corners Of the land to pay tribute TO our
masterlv inactivity. This is hard upon
our nominee for president, Henry
George, but il is not meant for him; it
is meant fo} that unruly, ungovernable
wing Of The party that thinks there is
still some more false image-smashing to
be done, and is not content to stay its
haud because the ft of "atatesmanlike
construction" has seized US. In truth,
since we, John Swinton, turned from
our trade bf \destructionist, lin which
we were an expert-and took to party
moulding. We have received some
pretty hard knocks from those who for
merly cheefed us on. remember that
when we sagelv congratulated the move
ment that archbishop Corrigan's pas
toral denouh hcing Georgism had been ls-
sued after aud not before the great cam
psign, Libe eEty Of Boston had q charm.
ing CONNIE mt on the wisdom of those
who would attempt to make revolu-
ton out of forces that an arch bishops
letter could put to flight. How too it
must have amazed the readers whom
we carefully schooled in the doctrine OF
the "Satanic pres \" to find that scarcely
had we-through our alter ego Dom
Piatt-"take en off our hat to Terrence V.
Powderlv as the greatest statesman Of
the age" when the same Satanic press
began with one accord to idolize our
idol! There was surely something
wrong in all this; the sum ought to have
worked out differently.
Yes, thene IS something very decid-
edly wrong in all this; there is nastv
little cancer growing, which will mean
the death to the movement of John
Swinton, and many another good men,
ber, unless the knife is promptly and
unflinchinaly applied. We have thrown
aside the grim visags of war under
which we bravely hurled down shams
of every kind, and we now pipe as
peacefully As any politician Of bringing
together a party; we have quit our good,
honest trade Of making men, and we
have taken to that mos. contemplate
Of all methods of wasting time-the at.
tempting TO force artificial combina.
tions. We have writ on our forehead
and writ uncommonly large too-the
word "pdhtician," and by this mark all
men may know us,-that our philosophy
and that bf the politician are identical
in every respect, for like him we ask not
quality but quantity like him we count
our adherdnts as cattle are counted, by
their number and their weight and not
as men eserve to be considered-indi-
vidually-b bach man being esteemed for
the possibilities of greatness that lie
within hirh.
Crooked courses make men blind
and 80 blind have we become to facts,
that it ID the men like the present
writer-the extreme radicals, whom we
now look askance at as discord breeders
who have to remind us OF what is oul
real glory |; the one great. imperishable
fact upon which We can justly pride
ourselves. That fact is this: that few
bold, plaih-spoken pioneer labor papers
such as John Swinton's was, got to tn,
hearts of a few seekers after truth
reused their moral indignation, anC
made men of them. Those men hav,
made movement, which will continue
so long, aud only so long as there ar,
men in 1T who care neither for man
God nor devil-and surely much less 70
party combinations-bu strike for tl
right alone. If John Swinton descend
from his position of one Of the mover
Of the movers, and takes to hunting will
the pack. he may rely upon it that Their
will be others who will have somewhs
too much self.respect to initiate his fall
Brave men existed before .Agatnem
non fought lis fight, and there hav
been deep, earnest thinkers long belor
any of our modern writers was breechsC
As l am 4 free thinker it Is natural ths
| should rely good deal upon the bi
BILE. What we actually know Of ths
book 10 that it Is the history of natul
ally intellectual people, forced by re
peated trials to do some pretty soil
thinking Do you think that the ma
who wrpte the story Of the fall {
sodom ahd Gomorrah. for want of ha
. dozen pure minded men. could nc
have told Messrs. swinton and Pow
derly something worth listening
about thb influence of dead-in-earne'
minority2 Or taKe tho teachings
Christ. bearing in mind that the ma
who 'rstolutionised the the thought
half the world. and whose teaching
after nearly nineteen centuries ha'
passed sway. stall in the viser Of yout
must Of hsesasity have bssa > thinker